Come on. You know that The Three Way would have a 69% chance to hit

A great reminder of some key points as I get used to my new Sorcadin that I’m playing in campaign atm :). Also: I’m thinking Spirit Shroud may deserve an honorable mention nod when discussing Holy Weapon as the damage can actually scale. Only one minute, bummer, but maybe for those single big bad fights… Mostly I’m just glad that my next video isn’t also on a Sorcadin. It’s a Bardadin. 🙄😂

“I know I don’t tell you how to have fun but come on, 3 way sounds fun” We see you Chris 👀 lol

Another thing to note about Holy Weapon: You don't need to cast it on yourself. If the party has a ranged attacking machine, like a full on rapid fire crossbow expert fighter, consider putting the Holy Weapon on their crossbow instead of your own spear. They'll probably get more use out of it than you would.

Don’t forget that you can extend the aid spell (upcast!) to 16 hrs and take a long rest to get you spell slot back and still have aid up for 8 hrs.

We're two minutes in and I see that Treantmonk has decided to follow the classic, sage wisdom that: "A jack of all trades and master of none, is often better than a master of one." This should be a great build!

I think people often get far to into damage and don’t value defense in the builds I see at high level. People seem to get saves being clutch people and High AC but resistance temp point points and saves seem to be an afterthought in so many builds I have seen. That is why so many (not all) seems to not understand how dangerous the Drake in the Drakewarden was compared to the beast master. I am glad you pointed out the usefulness of the spells you brought up at the end here.

Poppin in to say you're super cool and an asset to the community!

Hello again Chris! Watched a little bitof D4 Deep Dive, now back to the Playlist!

Correct me if I'm wrong, but Shield, Absorb Elements, and Blade Ward all apply to the Steed when using Find Steed There are other great spells that also apply

Was super excited for this build and it didn't disappoint! I didn't expect a lot of the decisions and your explanations of what you took, when, and why, really helped me to more deeply understand the game's mechanics. Also, thank you for your detailed reply to my comment last video Chris! Wonderful content as always 🙇‍♂️🙏

So, I just had to comment, because I've been playing this *exact* build on a PBP server practicably, Devotion instead of Glory, but what I just wanted to chime in with is: The character obtained a Ruby Weave Gem. Should you have the insane luck that I did, and get such, you can now use your 9th level slot on a 9th level spell. Pretty fantastic.

I was twisting around level 6 paladin before multiclassing. This was before Chris mentioned the find steed spell. I am convinced it's the right way to go for this build now.

Extend spell is great for Aid as well. Cast it at your highest spell slot before a long rest. You wake up and still have 8 hours of extra hit points. You, and two other allies can have 40 extra hit points with a 9th level slot. So nice!

Love the Videos, thanks for the Effort in these builds!

I agree with you on the str decisions think it's ok to keep your str relatively low. You could get your str to an 18 and be pretty happy, but you probably shouldn't even try to get it up to 20. Str boosting items are relatively common and only get more common at high levels. You kind of need specific weapons to make str good enough to worry too much about. For example a flame tongue or something will probably increase damage significantly but you lose your bonus action attack. your bonuses for having a +2 spear are so reliable and let you smite more frequently as you hit more frequently.

Again, you definitely kept your promise! Thanks man!!!

I think for the Bborn variant you meant Saur-adin as in dino-SAUR? Suffix. -saur. Used in the common names of extinct reptilian creatures such as dinosaurs. As a dragon is like a flying dinosaur.

One thing I love about your videos is that they go into game mechanics, and it always makes me want to create an alternative system which is something I've always been passionate about but given the fact that I'm most housebound and isolated I don't focus on the way I should; if I'm not going to present the game to a group it winds up on the back burner as fun ideas . . . but when you're talking about optimizing D&D I always start thinking "Well what if . . . " and eventually that might be motivation enough to do something.

I approve of the mild jab at Mearls.

I'm a huge fan of this archetype. There are so many options it's hard to say if one is more or less optimal than another. I'm currently running a 3 way multiclass... sora like a coffeelock strapped to the back of a pally. Variant Human Crusher Feat, lvl 5 Vengeance Paladin, lvl 2 Prismari Sorcer, lvl 3 Dao Warlock pact of the chain.

After the last video I tried to build my own soradin. It didn't go too great, instead I think I managed to optimize ineffectiveness to a new low. But practice makes perfect.

Love watching ur videos great content as always ur up there as some of the best and build channels keep it up. I'm trying to get back into dnd last time I played was 3.5 in high school 14 years ago and now I always wanna try 5e and always love playing range or spell character builds love to try out a spell sniper build that shoot spells from super far away and hit super hard as hell too chance for a video on that

I recently joined an existing game that was 11th level (it will go to 20th) and one thing I have found insanely useful taking Aberrant Mind so far after a handful of sessions is switching out "Arms of Hadar" for "Silvery Barbs" on the Psionic Spells list. Being able to throw out Silvery Barbs like they are going out of fashion (well really once per round since you only get one reaction) is pretty nice even at high levels.

I personally enjoy a Variant Tiefling so I can fly with medium armor. I always love your builds, keep it up!!

Really hope you will do a full video on that Soar Adin in the future as it also seems really cool. And flying enemies can be the bane of a Paladin.

Being looking forward to watching this

Hey Chris! Love your videos as always, especially these last several because I'm a huge fan of Gish characters. This could apply to all your remakes I'd be really curious to get your take on how this new soradin compares to your old one (ultimate spellsword). Do you think there were some problems with the first one that you addressed here? Or was this just a different take on it?

I would love to see your spell lists for the Clockwork and Aberrant Mind variants too! Just because the Divine Soul list is so Cleric heavy, and I feel like a lot of people will also be building Sorcadins with the more arcane focused Sorcerers.

For those who don’t like those subclasses: The Dark Knight (Oathbreaker/Shadow Sorcerer). It has some utility since you get Darkvission from Shadow Sorcerer, and the dog is gets your aura of protection buff. Seeing through darkness gives you advantage, advantage means crits, and paladins love crits.

Side note. You mention the tactical advantage of focus fire. While I completely agree, and it's commonly accepted, almost no one goes on to mention over-kill. In the cases when the party is facing multiple foes, and focusing on one, it's not uncommon for the Big Hit Guy to down one enemy with enough extra damage they could have taken out another one. All that extra damage is wasted. This is where multiple target actions can pick up the slack. So go ahead with your DPR based on multiple targets. It's a valuable comparison.

3 way sounds fun! Had me cracking up

I think telekinetic would be really great with the gem dragonborn variant! you could use it to pull enemy into spirit guardians or push it into web!

I think I'd like to use Tasha's Otherworldly Guise on an abjuration wizard. Seems like it would be pretty fun there.

Another excellent Sorcadin build. I just can't move on from a Turn 1 Conquering Presence/Necrotic Shroud + Quickened Spirit Guardians from the Fallen Aasimar Conquest/Divine Shield build. It's just so psychologically satisfying.

Love the build! What would you do differently of, for example, you could be assured you'd have guantlets of ogre power by level 4 (I read that is common in adventure league play)? Presumably stop at 13 STR and go custom lineage instead for infravision and higher starting CHA?

With the new Astral Drifter background from Spelljammer, you can cast spells at level 1. So with that and Variant human (or custom lineage) a Paladin could start with War Caster at level 1.

When you need higher single target damage than what Spirit Guardians can provide consider Summon Celestial. -1 hour duration -Using a 6th-level spell it will attack 3 times for 2d6+8 radiant damage per round (Avenger) at 150 ft. short range, 600 ft. long range. -It can heal for 2d8+6 HP once per day. -It can soak 50 damage that could’ve gone to you or your party essentially saving you from having to use that Heal spell.

We all know that save or suck spells are generally bad, but there's something so satisfying about quickened hold person/monster into double attacks. Not optimal, but so much fun

Hey Treantmonk! Been following you since GiantITP 4e days, thanks for the guide! I'm thinking about building a Divine caster with some frontline potential. When you're thinking about where a build belongs, what are some signs in party comp that would help me choose between a Divine Soul Soradin or a Life Cleric?

I'm actually interested in this concept.

Hey so I was theorizing a soradin for my Curse of Strahd campaign, oath of devotion. Maybe getting the oath aura would be more beneficial (then taking 8 levels for ASI) than going Sorcerer after 6? What are your thoughts?

Hey Treantmonk, First off, thank you for all you do for the community. I’m currently at level 9, 6 vengeance/3 divine soul, planning on doing a very similar build to this, so thank you for the write up, thoughts, and ideas. My question is what are your thoughts using spiritual weapon instead of booming blade? It’s got more flexibility, only needs to use one spell slot, it is much more flexible by being able to use it against other enemies within 20ft… My DM kind of uses his knowledge against us, if you have advantage or put something up like booming blade, he just won’t move and always attacks with multiple enemies so mobility is not as big of a problem. I’m also using shadow blade in dim light or darkness for advantage on all Melee attacks. Thanks for all you do, and if anybody else has ideas or thoughts on this, please let me know. Thanks

I think you forgot that with Divine soul sorcerer you can swap out your alignement spell (in this case Bane) for another first level spell. So you can pick up healing word to bonus action bring an unconscious ally back up.

If the goal of this build is to be a Jack of All trades, and be solid in many different aspects or in many different scenarios... I would suggest going with the blind fighting style and picking up fog cloud as one of your sorcerer spells. What I have noticed playing a paladin is that you are usually in a pretty good spot, and you can handle tough fights well usually. But when the DM tries to challenge you, or the party finds something that is really not great for them, or theyre just in a bad spot, fog cloud can be really good for leveling the playing field. With blindsight this basically gives us a double buff on offense and on defence. Plus honestly blindsight just has a lot of other useful situations. As a paladin you already ignore a lot of effects or resist them well, being able to deal with the blinded condition, and handle all other scenarios that dont require sight is pretty good, and personally I would trade the 2 damage per attack for that versatility.

PAM + Dueling Fighting Style + Shield + Spear is the perfect build for a Feat starved Paladin. All the benefits of sword and board but a lot more damage.

I'm doing a Sword n Board Redemption Clockwork Soul Sorcadin. Currently only level 5 right now. Gunning for 6 in Pally then I might focus or sorc. Feats I'm using is War Caster. Definitely gonna pick up Tough to make up for Sorc hit dies. Definitely getting Resilient Con.

I got a good dice roll so I built a sorcadin with a charisma of 20 at level 1 (18 + racial) and Dex based damage (I was building around shadow blade and wasn’t originally going to dip into Paladin) and barely had a 13 in strength for the multiclass. My Int is like a 0 and my Wis is a -2 I believe. It’s a fun character to RP. Anyways, it’s pretty cool to have a +5 to charisma and +4 to Dex early on. It helps with wanting to make a hungry sorcadin that wants all the feats. Considering my campaign will want to go to level 11, I’ll get 2 feats, so having high stats really helps with the power hungry nature in sorcadin. I believe my constitution is a +2.

Hey Chris two questions? One how would you say the strixhaven background impacts the build and on an unrelated note any chance you'll be revisiting the your variant of 5e?

I am hoping you will take a crack at pal2/swordbard rest in teh future, I am really interested in what you would come up with

Great video!! I really like this build for my draconid soul Sorcadin, but I picture him using a rapier and a shield... Would shield Master be a dcent option for the lvl 1 feat?? I am trying to decide between: - Shield Master -Tough -Inspiring leader Or maybe getting a half feat and rising dex to 12 -Gift of the Gem dragon (because flavor) -Resilient constitution -Telekinetic -Heavy armor Master

i personally would build differently though i don't see anything wrong with your choices. i just prefer staying away from heavy armor (i like decent initiative and the ability to stealth as needed) and like the value of a hexblade 1 dip. i don't see a big value in going for extra attack either as we can build around booming blade and just mitigate the dmg lost from a lack of extra attack by having more spell slots to smite more often. in my games, while i found aura of protection powerful i found that it usually boosts just myself and the steed as the paladin tended to be on the frontlines and everyone else was a ranged attacker staying in the backlines. with that said, i went with divine soul 1->hexblade 1->divine soul 3->pal 2->divine soul 7 progression. quicken spell was also mitigating the loss of extra attack.

We dont get to twin the blade cantrips anymore, but we can still quicken them and thats a big part of a sorcadins kit. The ability to nova hard when necessary.

I think a neat variation to this build is to start with GWM, pick up defense fighting style, and go devotion paladin. This soradin build cannot afford to increase STR until much later on, but devotion's channel divinity does offset that burden by using CHA to increase +hit. Plus, attacking with a big sword is just way cooler than attacking with a spear.

So... if I'm playing in a 15th lvl one shot would you still recommend Vuman? Or did/do the new race changes make another race better? Or does the Gem DB increase in viability at this point?

I have a similar build! hahaha. But I went conquest paladin 6. In my opinion, is the best subclass for now because it gives you the armor of agarthys and this spell is awesome to upcast. I got GWM instead because my bonus actions would be busy. Here's what I do: Round1: Bonus action armor of agarthys, attack twice, round2: bonus actions spiritual weapon, attack thrice. round 3: Bonus action spirit guardians, attack twice. Round4: bonus actions: Convert a spell slot into more sorcery points because you already used 4 out of 5. You can bonus action mirror image also, giving yourself more defense. This build is action economy heavy, that's why I don't use polearm master but GWM. I use my warhorse as an ally to give more damage and when possible makes my enemies prone besides to help me flank, always giving me advantage on my attacks. I know this build is about DPR, I think shield and misty step should be highlighted as tools to make the battlefield more interesting. Out of combat also. I use spells like detect thoughts with subtle spell against NPCs all the time to know what they are they are hiding.

this is actually a great video for War Cleric Domain characters too. Sure, no Smite or Aura of Protection, and no need for Polearm Master, just upcast Spirit Guardians 1st rnd and then upcast Spiritual weapon 2nd rnd, then either attack or dodge. High AC with a shield, any ancestry/race. But those spells are even easier as a straight caster, goes to show how Spirit guardians is so powerful.

I play a level 17 Sorcadin with 6 levels of Paladin in a party where I'm the only multiclasser. I can easily keep up or surpass the damage of all others, besides the rogue. I went Mountain Dwarf oath of Devotion & Storm Sorcery. Gish play-style where I smite mostly only on crits, and choose stormy/thundery spells for flavour. It's a super super fun character. With a fighter, barbarian, rogue and ranger, I went mostly Sorcerer so that our Bard wasn't the only good caster in the party. Also, I've never ever failed a concentration check.

That chance to hit comment at 17 minutes or so had me smiling. You're right, if course. That said, you're giving guesses with a precision of two decimal places, so I can see where the commenter is coming from.

I think, I don't know if I'm wrong, but your steed could breath as bonus action for 8d6 too... Sorry for late comment, but, I am doing a Open Sea / Sorcerer for Taldorei right now...And, of course, I revisited this post for ideas... its 19th level, but worth it to mention... Thanks, Chris.

Next hour is gonna be a good one ((((:

I am about to start the new vecna campaign and am planning on building this (or something very similar). What changes would you make for a character that starts at level 10 and goes until 20? You mentioned GWM as one possible change. Anything Else? Would you consider a hexblade here in that case? Thanks!

Currently playing a socardin (2 paladin:11 sorcerer). I wanted to create a more powerful sorcerer, capable to be in the frontline. Ability scores and skills: I must say my character is decent to good in some skills and really bad with the rest. Overall, I like this since I can use this for rping. Saving throws: I exchanged Wisdom for Constitution and as a spellcaster, that is not a good trade but I have war caster and I rarely fail Con saves. Party role: my original and current role is to be a secondary tank and support character. My DM allowed me to improve my shield (spellcasting focus) over time, increasing it to +3 now. With heavy armor and shield and I have an AC of 21 or 26 with the shield spell. I have been surrounded by 6 enemies and escaped unharmed several times. This takes all my low levels quickly but it creates plenty of time for my party to take down the enemies around me. Damage: I don't deal a lot of damage unless I use a spell (animate objects is my favourite) but as I mentioned my role isn't that. You can always smite. Conclusion: The ability to be a full spellcaster capable to be in the frontline is stupidly useful, holding the line against an adult dragon for at least 5 rounds while the rest of my part healed. My case is unique since I can have a high AC but I strongly recommend this build if you want to be a semi-tank and a full spellcaster. As mentioned in the video, you can take many routes so I would suggest thinking exactly which role you want to fulfill in the party AND discuss it with your DM

Hey Chris/others, what do you think about sentinel on this build to stop folks moving out of the spirit guardians?

Hmm would have thought that Sentinel Feat would also be an option at level 1. More reaction attacks starting out with, more battlefield control, and that nifty combo with mirror image once higher level. Also allows going sword and board. Guess it also depends on party comp and what role you want to play. Are you the main tank? Off tank? DPS? Buffer etc. Regarding the proficiencies I would always pick Persuasion or Intimidation. Given the high charisma you are often the face of the party.

The Booming Blade aspect of this build is really nice. It's really good, and I like that it's consistently effective. But because of the investment: one class for Booming Blade, one for weapon proficiency, at least one feat for War Caster, and maybe a second for Polearm Master, it does a great job of balancing the good effect with a reasonable cost. So it doesn't feel like an exploitation of the rules, just a cool combination.

I mean with animate objects you could just keep a stock of 10 +1 magic daggers which would be considered tiny objects. So then you don't have to worry about damage resistance, this will even take down a barbarian because most barbarians are not immune to magical piercing damage! As a 15th level character, which is the point you can cast this as a sorcadin, gold won't be an issue to buy very low level magic weapons, and you can probably even make them yourself by then!

at what starting point would you consider GWM instead of polearm master in terms of starting off? you mentioned peak is between 11-16th level. is it as easy as to say if you're starting above 10th level, take GWM intead, use a two handed weapon and perhaps take defence as the fighting style instead and then always use GWM in combat?

I'm thinking of doing almost this, but taking a 13,10,16,8,10,16 ability distribution (+1 to con/cha for variant human), and doing a 1-level Hexblade Warlock dip at level 2. The downside is that level 1 will of course be weaker, and we'll be delaying a lot of our abilities and Sorc spell progression by one level, but the tradeoff is we get 16 Constitution for more hp/better saves, Booming and/or Green Flame Blade (and/or our choice of a utility cantrip) and CHA-based attacks from level 2, plus a pact magic slot and our choice of some good Lock spells (including Shield and Armor of Agathys) added to our arsenal. Any good reasons this wouldn't be worth it?

Question. Does spirit guardians work on your steed do you could separate and have two going?

qick questtion: Spirit Guardiens is a spell that targets the caster to cerate a spelleffect that tagets outher creatures. Does my "Find Steet Horse" extend it teh spell or maybe even replicate it?

Could one, using Warcaster, metamagic distant spell a booming blade with a reach weapon to get that secondary bb damage on an aoo?

What do you think about mixing a few levels of warlock to sort of fuse Soradin with Coffeelock ? Increase potential for smite spam and all 🤔

Staff of Power Polearm master Sorcadin bonking and casting =P Player : imma use my staff of power to cast divine smite on the giant DM : you cant do that Player : sure i can *smash the giants toe with the staff

Would like to see a version of this build with paladin 2 / sorcerer X too. Please :)

hi! could you instead go flail + crusher feat booming blade instead of Polearm master?

Hey Chris, I was curious if you could do a video on low level multi classes that are effective. So many seem like the "click" at level 10 or higher, and I rarely play in games that get that high, and even when I do so much of the campain is spent knowing I've got way cooler things on the horizon. Not that this build for example isn't effective early, but the real pay off takes a while, and I guess I'm just impatient.

PAM granting a bonus action attack is awesome for nova rounds, like when fighting a boss or dangerous monster. That extra attack is an extra chance to strike. GWM gets so frustrating with nothing to mitigate that -5, especially in the lower levels. You miss miss and miss all the time. I suppose Bless could somewhat mitigate the -5 to hit, but burning a round to cast it is bad given the tight action economy of 5e (and how short many combats are). Vengeance Pal can get advantage occasionally. That would somewhat mitigate the -5.

Hey Chris loved the video as always would it hurt the build extremely badly to add a one level dip maybe at level 1 or 2 to get hexblade so you aren't quite as MAD and maybe a mountain dwarf for their unique armor stuff with Tashas ability to give bonuses

I am always curious why summons are not covered in these? How does summon draconic spirit compare? 6th level dragon makes three attacks and a breath weapon plus sorcadin 3 attacks seems like a lot of damage

I'd love to see a Paladin/Warlock multiclass build too!

Wat i like about crits with my dm is if u crit it does the automatic damage plus the roll

I was just watching the Double-Bladed Scimitar video from 2020, wondering if that might have uses here. The character is pretty feat-starved, however, so freeing up that feat could make sense, in theory. If you could get an 18 strength at some point, that'd be a nice perk. Since you can't start with Warcaster as Variant Human and a half-feat at level with either VH or Custom Lineage probably doesn't really stack up, the best I can think of is to go Mountain Dwarf for two +2s to start with 17s in Str/Cha, to use a single ASI later to get a pair of 18s. Level 4 is still going to be Warcaster probably, so that ASI for double 18s isn't going to hit until 10th level. Once it happens, you have +1 to hit, but -1 damage compared to a Spear with Dueling. That's generally a good trade, but nothing major. You lose access to +2 AC from a shield, however. You have a choice of a fighting style, but that's not going to be super impressive. Great Weapon FS basically just puts your damage on par with the Spear version, or Defense claws back some of the AC but you're still behind. One of the utility Fighting Styles (cantrips, blindsight, protecting allies) wouldn't be bad, but nothing too special. At least at first glance, having 18 strength with a DBS build doesn't strike me as that much better. But even if that 18 strength was truly great after level 10, the cost getting there was high. You're missing +2 damage and +2 AC for the first 9 levels. Double scimitar does not seem worth.

Something to remember, any transformation spell also applies to your steed. With Draconic Transformation those are two breath weapons per round, crazy good damage.

In a game were we can power attack up to our proficiently with every weapon without fitness, would you still go polarm master?

30:00 I don't know if you're correct here, IMO the rules are unclear about order of events. The way the PHB phrases opportunity attacks, the opportunity attack happens before the enemy leaves your reach, which implies that it's the _intent_ of leaving your reach that triggers the opportunity attack, not the leaving itself. This interpretation would mean that the creature will still be within reach while surrounded by booming energy, and thus can choose to not leave reach after being struck. Just from a balance perspective too I think this is more fair since it seems a bit busted to get a 1d6+3d8+STR opportunity attack at level 5.

So just a question for ya Chris, I was noodling with a build for an artificer armorer, custom linage with telekinetic at lvl one and sentinel at lvl 4. The idea is with mirror image sentinel and a 20 ac at lvl 5 I would basically have strong influence over 16 squares on a battle map. So enemies would have a bear of a time attacking me yet not really feel good about attempting to disengage because of sentinel and the thunder gauntlets effect. The real pickle arises at lvl 5 when the character does about 13 pts of damage per round when using bonus action to pull or push someone. When using Homunclous bonus action attack I’m a at about 15.5 per round. With farrie fire up that’s 18 per round and using heat metal it’s about 21 per round. So I can stay comfortably above baseline while constraining but both is those take a round of set up where damage suffers. The tanking method of mirror image and controlling enemies also takes a round of set up. So I guess the over all question is are there situations where you would choose to do less than baseline damage for 5ft of forced movement (outside of obvious big damage effects like pushed into lava or off a cliff)? And as a whole would u consider this build viable?

How well does Sunbeam compare, it seems it would be pretty good burst if quickened but I guess that's just sorcerer shenanigans.

Nice!

I wonder what the dpr is of Tashas other worldly guise is if you took great weapon master instead of inspiring leader. Also if you add to that bless assuming you have a party member who casts it on you.

Oh snap! That build name!

Great Video, was thinking about playing this next! The only Question I have is; why not go for Distant Spell, instead of Subtle Spell, to increase the range of Spirit Guardian? It would increase the range from 15 to 30 and make it more likely to effect more enemys.

A 3 level paladin "dip" still grants access to level 9 sorcerer spells by level 20, but at the cost of multi attack. 5 levels in pally creates a spell casting, smite stacking multi attack beast, but one that will never reach level 9 spells. It is for this reason I favor a 2 level start in pally (martial weapons, heavy armor, shield and smite) for one of the bard, warlock or wizard sub classes with multi attack when going for a pally/caster build. Best of both worlds, no need to compromise. Frankly, the build is a bit painful in the level 5-7 stretch. Suffered through that once, never again. Now I only bust that build out for one shots or joining mid campaign when told to create a level 8+.

"Dipping into Sorcerer is tempting but getting to level 6 paladin should be the number one priority" Me, who did dip. Oops.

I think when people say chance to hit is 65% they mean like the standard level 5, +7 to hit against 15 AC. But here's the thing 5% of that is rolling the 20, so if you calculate crit into dpr, you can't count that twice. So yes 65% to hit, 60% to hit normally and 5% to crit and the math checks out. Also if you use the same hit chance for the baseline as for what you compare it to, there is basically no difference anyway.

I doubt I'm the first to mention this as this is over a year old at this point, but something worth mentioning in regards to racial choice What you could do is take the Gem Dragonborn and use a Double-bladed Scimitar with the Defense fighting style. This ends up with a smidge less damage than PAM+Dueling with one less AC, but its close enough imo to be effective, especially with the benefits Dragonborn gives you. Meanwhile, you save feats, you dont need PAM and you dont need War Caster, at least not immediately. You could point buy a 16 STR and a 17 CHA, take something like Fey Touched to bump the CHA up at level 4 and have max CHA by level 10. The nice thing is once you have those Sorcerer levels and a lot of spells and bonus action options, you could decide then to swap out the Double-Bladed Scimitar if you want and it wont feel like you wasted a feat or anything. Just some food for thought

How different would this character's damage be after level 5 if you took Great Weapon Master instead of Polearm Master? Polearm Master looks like the more fun of the two options, but isn't GWM just flat out more powerful once you're in mid levels?

About spirit guardians and movement in it. Your movment speed is a limit of how much feet you can use to move in turn. RAW if you are in spirit guardians range as an enemy, and you move 15 ft.(out of spell range) you used up 30 ft of movement in that turn. If your move speed is 30 that is all your movment, and you need to dash if you wanna move more.

Any issues on booming blade’s 5 feet range being used with the polearm’s reach?

Is taking 2 levels of fighter for action surge so you could cast a spell and take two attacks worth it?